The 20-Year Reunion
I received an email the other day through Classmates.com. It was from an event organizer to inform me of my 20-year high school reunion. Oh, man. I knew this was coming. But oh, man.
I remember my father taking the whole family to his 20-year reunion. I was just shy of 10 years old at the time. But it seems like such a short time ago. Now here I am. My father was always fond of those "one day" phrases. "One day, you'll actually miss school." "You can't wait to grow up now, but one day you'll wish you were a kid again." And so on. It doesn't help that most of them turned out to be true.
So my feelings about the reunion are conflicted. On the one hand, I'm happy for the chance to catch up with all of my old friends. And I did have a lot of friends. Then there's the recognition that I'm hitting yet another milestone in my life that I remember my parents passing by in their lives. I mean, my father was an old man in my eyes when we went to his reunion. How can it be that I'm at the same point now that he was then?
I am happy at this point in my life. Despite how I viewed my father all those years ago, 37 really isn't old. I'm relatively healthy and managing to keep my weight at a reasonable level. I exercise regularly, both by going to the gym and by hiking up mountains whenever I can (and I'll be adding cycling to that starting this spring). I'm actually healthier now than I was at 30. But my hair is thinning. And I've got a patch of gray at my right temple. And there's the constant tickle in the back of my mind that 40 is fast approaching and a 20-year high school reunion is one step closer to it.
I'll go to the reunion and be happy about it. Then I'll start steeling myself for my forthcoming mid-life crisis!